In the fall of 2012 Daniel and Mark had an idea for a video series about the history of words. The concept was simple, create short, edgy, funny films that follow a single word through history and geography to find their way into our outlandishly bombastic American mouths. A few years and a lot of writing, rewriting, film producing, editing, pitching to networks, pitching to production companies, filming more stuff and adding bits here, removing bits there later, we have the first episode of this series to show you. And boy are we excited. Thus was born 26 Words. Here’s the full pitch for that show.
Behind every word is a story…
Entomology is the study of insects. This is not a show about bugs. It’s about words. Etymology is the study of the history of words. Oddly enough, the etymology of the word entomology isn’t really all that fascinating. Luckily there are lots of other words.
Anyway, every word in the English language comes from somewhere, usually from another language and another place. What we don’t often realize is that some of these words have surprisingly epic stories and the journey they take to become part of the English language, is sometimes more fascinating than the prose they create on the page. This show is about precisely these words.
Each episode of 26 Words feels like a love letter to Schoolhouse Rock and Monty Python’s Flying Circus. It’s a series that unlocks the remarkable stories behind 26 common, and at times, not-so-common English words, one word from each letter of the alphabet. It does so in 5-7 minute narratives, each of which follows one word. Each episode is composed of irreverent, comical, and absurd historical recreations of how the word traveled from culture to culture to find its way into our American mouths. The pieces are a mixture of live-action and animation weaving together a magical tapestry of lexicographic delight.
Take, for example, the word chess. This word seems simple enough and yet its simplicity belies a bizarre, globe-trotting history. The game itself was likely born in India in the 6th century AD. However, the word actually comes from Persia and is a word that still exists today, shah. The word, in Persian, meant king. And, as will be interesting in just a few sentences hence, a dead king was called a shah mat. From Persian, the word leapt to Arabic as shah and then across the Med to the Roman Empire and common Latin as, oddly enough, scaccus. The Gauls (or French) then took a liking to it as eschec and finally in the 13th century it found its way into British English where it stuck around as exchequer (a fancy term for their treasury) and ultimately hopped across the pond to American English as chess. Why? Because the game of chess is about defending the king, and shah means king. Oh, and shah mat? That became checkmate.
While the series is geared towards an audience in the coveted 8 to 14 age range who find words nifty (and might also like Miranda Sings and an occasional game of Exploding Kittens), it also resonates with an older audience who might enjoy watching the show with their particularly intelligent children.
The storytelling is charmingly sprinkled with anachronistic absurdity and densely packed and richly layered with detail to allow viewers to experience moments of discovery and delight and allow them to feel smart and attentive. (We read this off the back of a box of Mendl’s chocolates and really liked it. Surprisingly, it’s also completely true).
Ultimately, the goal of the series is not only to provide an entertaining history of a given word’s grand entrance into our lexicon, but to engage our audience with the wonder of language in an effort to peak curiosity and deepen an understanding and appreciation for our culture which is, after all, defined by the confluence of language and history.
CHARACTERS
The Host. The uniqueness of each word’s story is reflected in its host. We pluck each episode’s host from the gamut of celebrities that include YouTubers, actors, musicians, experts, and athletes. The key being their connection to the word. For instance, ‘Shitty Robot’ YouTuber Simone Giertz for the Robot episode. Or Selena Gomez for the musical word Gamut. Each host guides us through time and space to unravel their word’s story. At times we allow a fictionalized version of their reality to leak into the show’s narrative with unpredictable results. For example, the near cancellation of the pilot episode, Robot, catches Simone off-guard and has her making a pivotal decision about her episode’s future.
The Comedy Troupe. Like Monty Python, a rotating group of diverse actors to portray history’s characters: famous (and not quite so famous) and fictional.
There is ample space for cameos, such as Alec Guiness as King Richard III or Jimmy Stewart as Helen of Troy. Katharine Hepburn would make a particularly ravishing Genghis Khan. All, of course, would be subject to availability.
ANIMATION
Each episode has a dominant animation style, however the style changes between episodes. So while one episode may be almost entirely hand-drawn cell animation, another might be populated with cut-out paper animation. When necessary, the animation style will shift within an episode to best fit the story.